


The Forget-Me-Nots of Will Herondale

by LadyoftheLillies



Category: The Dark Artifices Series - Cassandra Clare, The Infernal Devices Series - Cassandra Clare, The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-01
Updated: 2018-08-01
Packaged: 2019-06-20 07:22:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15529125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyoftheLillies/pseuds/LadyoftheLillies
Summary: Will Herondale was many things. He was a shadowhunter. He was angelic. He loved books with a passion to which no one could compare. But what made Will truly unique was his heritage. You see, Will is a shadowhunter, yet a Warlock too. Greater Demon blood flows through his veins along with his seraphic nature. One night, Will opens a demon box that reveals truths Will wished were false. Ever since then, he has shunned away anyone who could care about him. At least, he tried too. After all, what was the point of having love if he was going to lose it eventually?This an AU. What if Will lived forever, instead of Tessa?





	The Forget-Me-Nots of Will Herondale

It all started when William Herondale opened the stupid box. The action itself was innocent really, but what came afterward had lasting effects. Lasting is one word for it. William rather prefers the word eternal.  
Because opening the box let out something Will would never be able to not know. To not remember.  
Will was one to know words had lasting meaning. The words the demon had spoke, "You are not what you think you are. You are part angel. And part demon. You do not know a true mother."  
The demon's voice was slimy and he smelled like rotting flesh. Though the creature was small, his aura took up the room like a mighty shadow. The window, that had sunlight streaming in, was covered as though by a dark cloth.  
"You lie!" Will had cried out. What else should he have cried out?  
The demon shook it's head. One eye ball, out of many, was hanging by a red thread of a vein. Will's stomach flipped in disgust.  
"Oh, am I?" The demon spat. Quite literally. Part of the carpet began steaming where his spit had landed. "Ask your mother then. Ask them why they are hiding. Ask them why they do not love you."  
But he did not ask them that. Because he was afraid. Terrified of the answer he might get.  
Will knew he was different the moment he could remember anything. As the demon went on and on about how Will's mother was actually a greater demon, Will's heart began to shatter. The demon had no reason to lie. And Will could feel the truth awakening deep inside his bones. His blood seemed to call out, finally.  
Will had run away from home the next morning. With a bag full of clothes and books he made his way over the sloping hills of Wales. As he did so, Will let himself look at everything he loved once more.  
Perhaps one day he would come back here. Perhaps one day he would be the only relic remaining.  
He ran faster, as though to outrun his thoughts.

London was a dreary place. There was no sunlight nor speck of blue sky. They wasn't even any air. Will choked on smoke as he ran across the cobblestones. Men and women with deep frowns peered at him with disgust. He was covered in dirt and soil and tears and maybe blood. But he had made it to his destination.  
Will stopped outside the cathedral he knew was the London Institute. Hastily, he banged on the door repeatedly.  
It was as though begging for life. He needed to be here. He had no where else to go. He could not go home. He had to prove to himself and his family that he was more angel than demon. He did not need to be close to anybody. They would die and he would not.  
A woman with brown hair threw open the door. She stared down at him with wide and incredulous eyes.  
"You have to let me stay here! According to the codex any shadowhunter in need is allowed to stay here! In chap-"  
"I know that!" The woman snapped. She regained her composure and asked in a softer voice. "Why are you here, young man?"  
He gave her a bored look. "I just explained. I have nowhere else to go."  
The woman seemed surprised by his bitterness.  
Good, he thought, this was the version of him she would get to know.  
"What is your name?"  
"William Herondale." Will said, straightening his shoulders.  
After that the woman, Charlotte, had escorted him to a room. The shelves were bare and he placed his books on them. They looked nothing like the shelves at home. They were not empty, but lined with colorful spines of worried books.  
Will did not give any explainations. He met the other memebers of the institute. A girl with light blonde hair who seemed to mirror his attitude without even trying. Will would not like her, but at least she would not like him.  
Next was a man with red hair the color of roses. His face was scattered with freckles and he peered at Charlotte with adoring brown eyes. He did not notice Will until Charlotte pointed him out. She did not look like she liked the man who they called Henry. But she sat next to him at the dinner table anyway.  
They said there was a boy who worked for them there, but he was polishing weapons.  
Weapons. Will's heart had sank further than it already had. It was at his feet at this point.  
The idea of using weapons was usually an entertaining one. Will's father had kept a private office in their house. In that private office was gambling money and daggers he hid from mother. Will had once broken into there (the beginning of opening things he should not have) and played around with the dagger like it was a sword. He imagined himself Hamlet, dueling before the tragedy struck. And tragedy did strike. Because Will's father had walked in and Will almost went deaf from his father shouting at him.  
Will had not tried to go in since. Usually, it was just sticks and stones he'd found along the river side. Sometimes, Ella would duel with him.  
He remembered her face as they playfully fought. Her wet black hair was flying about and her smile was warm. Little Cecily had wanted to join, but Will thought she was too imature. This was battle, and Will did not want his little sister anywhere near it.  
Will might have also tried to decapitate a duck.  
He saw his sisters faces one more time as his family had tracked his steps. They stood outside the institute, thrashing about for Will to come home.  
Will had crawled under the bed and lain there until he could no longer hear their cries. He did not move, even as his tears seeped into the wooden floors boards, or even when Charlotte had come to get him for breakfast.  
No one asked Will a question about it. And for that he was thankful. They did not need to know the truth about him. They did not need to know him at all.

Will's brilliant plan failed when a new boy was introduced to the London Institute.  
From Shang Hai, Charlotte had said.  
His name was James Carstairs, but he told Will to call him Jem. Jem was also dying.  
At first look, Jem seemed like a healthy human being. He had the traces of trauma and hurt, but nothing fatal. Jem informed him that what was killing him was demon posion, slowly but steadily. They said he had a year or two at maximum.  
Will then hated himself. Here he was, despairing at the thought of living forever, when this boy would not live a full life time. Will wished there a way to cut his own time span in half, and give it to Jem.  
But, even though he was dying, Jem was kind. That shocked Will more than anything.  
Jem smiled and laughed and played the violin like he was not doomed. When Will had said this out loud, as he more often then not found himself doing in Jem's presence, Jem had smiled and said: "Aren't we all?"  
I'm not. Will almost said. And he hated that this Jem person was getting under his skin. Will had lived at the institute for over six months, and had established his boundaries with the other occupants. Jem was an odd ball though, as his father might have once said. He seemed to bring the truth out of Will as though Will was merley a rickety old well.  
Instead, Will said: "I believe I have another type of damnation different from death." That was true, but very vague.  
Jem had smiled at that too. Will flushed.  
Soon after that, Will asked Jem if they wanted to be parabatai. Will did not know why he had asked. Maybe it was because he was not alone when he was with Jem. Maybe it was because every great hero in every book he has ever read had a steadfast companion. Maybe it was because Jem was dying and a couple year relationship is easier to let go of than a life time one, right?  
Right?

A few years later, Will was almost killed by a vase. His whole life and enternity flashed before his eyes. Then he wished the vase had killed him.  
There had been a hint of demonic activity around this dark and gloomy place, so naturally the shadowhunters of the London Institute came to check it out. Except Jessamine of course.  
Thankfully, Will was still aging. From what he could tell from the other warlocks he had met, they stopped aging around eighteen or nineteen. Will tried not to think of this with panic. He would be eighteen next month, and how long could he keep a youthful face after that?  
But this night, as usual, Will lost himself in his demon hunting. Until he met a certain gray-eyed woman named Theresa Gray.  
She claimed to be kidnapped by two women. Two women then appeared out of thin air and started to chase them. For a girl who had just been tied to a bad, Theresa could run fast. Almost as fast as Will. She was as tall as him too.  
After a nifty fight, they all returned to the institute with the brown haired girl in tow. She explained that she had been kidnapped once she got off the boat from America. She did not know why. They did not want anything from her, except her blood.  
Will had sized her up with his eyes. She was keeping calm for someone who just got out of confinment. Jem was as welcoming as ever. He took her on tours of London and explained everything to her she wanted explained.  
Will had kept himself at a distance. Do not get close to her, his head whispered. I cannot stop, his heart screamed.  
Having Tessa Gray at the institute was a good thing, and a terrible thing.  
She started to break his barriers with mere sentences and book references. She must be stopped, but even as Will thought this he knew he did not want her to stop.

They day that the world came crashing down was a short while after.  
One moment, Will was standing there in his flesh and blood and bones. The next, he was made up of somebody else's flesh and blood and bones. He saw stars and memories and thoughts that were not his own. When he looked at the reflection of himself in everybody's terrified eyes, he saw a woman with a bloody chest.  
Will cried out and the world flashed again. He was himself once more. But he was not himself. He was William Herondale, the boy who could change flesh. The warlock.  
He was forced to tell everyone the truth about him, about the box and his mother's lineage and everything he wished no one to know.  
The shadowhunters took this surprisingly well. Sophie, the maid, had muttered: "I knew there was something demonic about him."  
Will would usually give her a grin whenever she made a passive comment like that, but he was shaking. The fact that he was a warlock was not new to him, but it felt fresh in the moment. Realization was a cruel thing. He had not known he'd been living in acute denial.  
Charlotte and Henry said this did not change anything. He wa still a shadowhunter, and that was alot being said by other shadowhunters. Will knew of their prejudices and their views on downworlders. He knew that if the clave found out, he would be forced into exile, or even executed.  
Will was on the floor, starring sightlessly. Somebody touched his shoulder, and Will looked up to see Jem standing above him. Everyone else had left the room, not that Will had noticed.  
Jem's dainty gray hair was disarrayed and his silver eyes were bright. He looked better today, more alive. The light that usually surrounded his being was brighter.  
"You are still Will Herondale the catastrophe." Jem said, sitting next to Will. Though they were grown, Jem put his arms around him. "My Will." He had said.  
"But- I became your parabatai knowing what I-"  
"I became your parabatai knowing I was dying." Jem said. "We are both selfish."  
And that was that. They sat there in front of the crackling fire holding eachother. Jem was made up of bones and skin but his heart was a roaring presence against Will's chest. He would never change. Even as the stars started to appear outside the window, they did not move. A massive blizzard could have blown the institute away and Will would not have let go.  
"I..." Will started. "I do not think I can bear to miss you forever."  
Jem had smiled at that. Will scowled. "What do you look so happy about? You are dying!"  
"But now I know," Jem said. "That I will have someone who will remember me forever."  
And for once, the concept of forever did not frighten Will.


End file.
